Wednesday, May 28, 2008

First day in Australia and, as predicted, there was immediately a lot of enthusiasm from the many Juventus fans residing in the Melbourne area. The whole team were able to see first-hand the great passion towards the Black and White colours - especially from Italians emigrated to this part of the world.

Indeed over two hundred supporters attended Ranieri's men's first training session at Princes Park Stadium, one the temples of Australian Rules football (and Carlton Football Club's home ground), given over to soccer for the day.

There was a lot of affection and cheers for all the players, particularly local boy Jess Vanstrattan, an ambassador of Australian soccer in Europe.

Before the start of the session, held just a few hours after flying in from Shanghai, there was a meeting with the local press at the Stadium to introduce Friday evening's event: the friendly between Juventus and the home side, reigning Australian champions Melbourne Victory. The two managers, Claudio Ranieri and Ernie Merrick, attended the conference alongside Jonathan Zebina and the Australian team's captain Kevin Muscat.

Ranieri and Zebina spoke about the game, to be played at 8 pm local time, 1 pm CET. "I'd already been in Australia in the ’80's – the Manager recalled – and I'm happy to be back. I know there'll be a huge crowd to see this game so I hope they can have fun enjoying a good match. I'm sorry we can't play some of the fans' idols, but Juventus are always Juventus, regardless of who goes on the pitch. Soccer in Australia? Australian players in our League have shown they have the right attitude. As for Victory, I know they won the last League title and I know their Manager is Scottish so I'm expecting them to be a very determined team".

The Telstra Dome, the Stadium where the game will be played, is a 60,000-seater facility. The buzz in town is that there'll be a full house, thanks to the very many Juve fans living here. Zebina and team mates will want to give joy to them especially: "We got here a few days early, so we'll have a little more time to prepare this match. In any case, the important thing is the attitude to have. A lot of people will be there just for us, ready to support us and push us on. We'll try not to disappoint them and to make up for our great players missing".